This invention relates to a novel method for polymerizing olefins using acetylene as a coinitiator.
It is well known that cyclic olefins containing at least one ring double bond can be polymerized under ring opening conditions. The olefin metathesis reaction is shown by equations (1) and (2) below and uses unsaturated hydrocarbons. ##STR1## Such a reaction has been previously brought about by combining a variety of materials commonly containing tungsten, molybdenum, or rhenium, with organic derivatives of aluminum, tin, or sometimes other metals. However, these initiators also induce contaminating side-reactions and the polyalkenamers produced are stereochemically inhomogeneous. Similar procedures apply to and also constrain the metathesis of acyclic olefins such as cis-2-pentene. It is thus desirable to accomplish olefin metathesis where the double bonds in the polymer or the monomer obtained are stereochemically highly homogeneous.